‘It could be.’ But he didn’t seem happy or excited. This was a different Perez from the one who’d sat beside her in the car in Yell, urging her on down the narrow roads to look for Monica Leaze and then to catch the ferry.

‘Perhaps you could tell us what she wanted then, Jimmy. It’s getting late.’ Willow was losing patience once more. This wasn’t the time for games. She thought she needed a large drink and remembered there was a bottle of Chablis in the fridge. Monica’s tipple. She set it on the table with three large glasses. ‘Come on, Jimmy. We won’t be going out again tonight. Pour us both some wine and tell us what this is all about. We have important information too. There’s a lot to discuss.’

‘Cilla has been having an affair,’ he said. ‘She thought Eleanor had found out about it, suspected that was why she’d asked Cilla to meet her for lunch the day before they all set off for Shetland.’

‘And Eleanor was upset? I don’t quite see how that’s relevant to her murder.’

‘The affair was with a younger man.’ He turned so that he was staring out of the window again. Willow hoped he wasn’t going to go moral and God-bothering on her. With Perez she never knew exactly how he would react. He looked back into the room and directly at her, weighing his words. ‘With Marcus Wentworth. Cilla’s field of expertise is Middle Eastern and North African art. He runs occasional cultural tours. That was how they met. The fact that Polly and Eleanor were friends was just a weird coincidence.’

‘But he must be half her age!’ Sandy sounded horrified.

Suddenly Willow felt wide awake, and she thought again that they could now look at the facts of the case from an entirely new perspective. ‘Well, that gives us a very strong motive, doesn’t it?’

Perez nodded. ‘I think Marcus was the man Eleanor met in the Bloomsbury restaurant. She was trying to persuade him to end the relationship with her mother. She knew how upset Polly would be if she found out. And Eleanor took a phone call from him when she was in the Sentiman. Again she was telling him to sort out the situation.’

‘Marcus has got Polly all lined up for the role of wife and mother,’ Willow said. ‘The woman to step into his mother’s shoes and become lady of the manor. Very aristo. He’s not going to be best pleased if Eleanor threatens to spill the beans to her best friend.’

‘I’m not sure how Polly would respond to the news, either. She seems fragile already.’